I Can Carry You
by Verdreht
Summary: "The mask's down; the act's dropped, and what's left is the strong but wounded teenage boy that's been tortured, traumatized, and forced to carry the weight of too many people for far too long. It's Derek's turn to carry it for a while." Derek finds out that Stiles got more than a bruised cheek and a busted lip from his run-in with Gerard. He's not happy. established Sterek


The locker room is rank. It always is, every time Derek finds himself in it, ripe with the acrid stink of sweat and grass and too much cologne.

It's different this time, though. Worse, in a way. The sweat's still there, and the grass and the cologne, but there's something else there. It burns his nose more than any of those other scents, curls his stomach and his lip both, and drives him up the wall. It's all he can do to keep his composure, walking past the stragglers slipping out to practice a little late and deeper into the locker room.

He sees Isaac first. He's leaning against a locker with his arms crossed and an anxious look on his face that eases just a fraction when he sees Derek. He pushes off the locker, and his whole posture screams '_oh, thank God.'_

"Where is he?" Derek asks. He doesn't need to, not really. He could figure it out. But the less eh has to think about that smell – embarrassment, panic, pain, _blood_ – the better chance he has of keeping himself under control.

Isaac nods stiffly towards the next row of lockers. "Scott's with him," he says through gritted teeth. Derek knows he smells it too, and he can't hardly stand it, either.

Derek doesn't say anything in response. Isaac knows he heard him, and he doesn't want to waste the time. Not now.

His instincts are roaring; it takes every ounce of self control he has to keep his steps measured as he walks towards the row of lockers Isaac pointed him towards. It's a fight he's been having ever since he got Isaac's text a few minutes ago.

_Something's wrong with Stiles. Could use your help ASAP. _

He'd been in the middle of staking out the alpha pack's movements with Peter when he'd gotten the text, and he hadn't waited around to text back for details. He didn't need to. It was selfish, and with everything going on, stupid, but Derek didn't care: Stiles is his. He takes priority.

He wishes now that he'd thought about that yesterday night.

Wishes don't change anything, though, and neither does the guilt tying his insides in knots. He's here, now. That'll have to be enough, at least until he's done what he needs to do.

He stops when he rounds the corner, just for a second. Scott's standing closest, already dressed in his lacrosse gear. Isaac was, too. And just past Scott, Derek sees what he's looking for. Or, more specifically, _who_.

Stiles is sitting on one of the benches, also in his lacrosse gear. He's got his head bowed in his hands, and his legs are bouncing a furious rhythm on the floor that's _almost_ as quick as his heartbeat. Derek could hear that before he even got out of his car in the parking lot. Hell, he could hear it when he was still halfway across town. It's fast. Unnaturally so, even for Stiles.

Derek's moving in an instant, passing Scott and going straight to where Stiles is sitting hunched on the bench. He drops to one knee in front of him – Stiles would probably make a joke about it, except he doesn't, and that's proof enough on its own that something's wrong – and reaches for his hand to pull it away from his face.

He's not expecting him to flinch. It's not violent or exaggerated, the way most of Stiles' movements are. He just tenses, pulls back and sits up straight, and Derek can't ignore the way his pulse quickens and his breath hitches.

Stiles hides it well, though. He always does, Derek thinks. He looks at Derek, then over to Scott, and he gets this 'you've got to be kidding me' look on his face that only looks halfway faked. "Really?" he says. "You, too? What, two werewolves couldn't handle Stiles duty? They had to call in big, bad, wolf-enforcements?" There's no bite in the words, though. Not even any of Stiles' usual spunk. To Derek, who's grown more accustomed to Stiles' voice patterns than he thought he'd ever want to, it sounds flat…tired.

It's a good act. A brave front.

But that's all it is.

Derek doesn't answer Stiles. Instead, he turns to Scott. "Go on," he says. "I'll take care of this." It's his place to do it. Stiles is his. And besides that, he knows there's no chance of getting that mask to drop if Stiles is still trying to put on a show for his friends. "You too, Isaac."

Scott hesitates. He doesn't want to go, doesn't want to leave his friend. Derek can respect that kind of loyalty. But this isn't the time.

"_Scott_." He forces as much command into the word as he can without it being a Command, and Scott finally nods.

"I'll tell Coach you weren't feeling so hot," Scott says. It's as much an apology as a promise.

Stiles just rolls his eyes. "Right, yeah, great. 'Cause that'll go over awesome," he says sarcastically. "Not like I'll be doing suicides the rest of my natural life or anything."

Scott just smiles apologetically and ducks out, and it's not long before the door closes and it's just Derek and Stiles.

"So, now what?" Stiles says. He's trying to sound casual, but even if Derek couldn't hear the way his heart was pounding, the way his legs bounced and his eyes darted around would've given him away. His whole body's thrumming with this nervous, restless energy. Even more than usual. "Am I in time-out or something? Are we just gonna sit here and stare at each other all awkwardly? Because I have, like, scary amounts of chemistry homework due tomorrow, and if you're not gonna let me practice, then I might as well get started on that. I might actually finish it before I'm a hundred-and-twenty years—"

"Stiles." Normally, Derek would at least let him finish his sentence or something, since Stiles is all upset. A constant stream of word vomit's kind of like his safety blanket.

Except he's not stopping. Not even pausing to take a breath, and it sounds almost…manic, to the point where Derek's half expecting his lips to start turning blue or his eyes to roll back in his head from lack of oxygen to his brain. It needs to stop.

Besides, Derek's all the safety Stiles needs.

He reaches for Stiles' cheek, and this time, he doesn't let his flinching stop him. He cups his hand to Stiles' bruised cheek and forces his head straight, and God, he hates Gerard for doing this. For marking what's his. For marking _Stiles_. For hurting him.

But he swallows it back. There's a time for fury, and that time will come. This is a time for something else, for looking after his pack. For taking care of his mate.

Whether he likes it or not.

"You're hurt." It's not a question. He can smell the blood and feel the pain, all the more now for finally touching him. And he realizes that this is actually the first time he's touched him since that night, since Stiles went missing from the lacrosse field.

Stiles snorts. "Can't get anything past you, can I?" he says, waving a little too emphatically at his cheek. His tone's not sharp, not strictly-speaking "mean." It's that 'I'm trying to be funny, please don't mind the emotional shitstorm behind it,' kind of voice that Stiles tends to fall back on when he's backed into a corner.

Derek resists the urge to sigh. Or growl.

"I mean the rest."

Stiles' pulse spikes, and Derek wishes he'd ever bothered to see how fast a human heart can beat without causing problems. Stiles has got to be getting close to that line.

"There is no 'rest,'" Stiles lies, and at Derek's pointed look, he shifts uncomfortably, but doesn't back down. "What? This isn't enough? I look like I went ten rounds with freaking Mohammad Ali. You know, if Ali was old and crazy and slowly dying of cancer. But hey, I may not have gotten shot in the arm or stabbed by a freakish lizard, but I'd say I got pretty sufficiently fucked up."

"Stiles," Derek says again, his voice low and just a little bit warning. "Show me."

Stiles swallows thickly, but he keeps that nonchalance on like it's covers on Derek's bed and he's just waking up. "You know? I think I'll pass."

"It wasn't a request."

"Of course it wasn't." A high-pitched, uneasy sort of chuckle that's just a little bit caustic bubbles from his chest. "The sourwolf doesn't make requests. He just glares and growls people into submission. Rerun. No thank you, seen it before." And then he starts to stand, and Derek's too busy watching the way his hand goes automatically to his side to stop him.

His distraction doesn't last long, though. Stiles is stepping back over the bench as Derek stands, and when he starts towards the end of the row, Derek is already standing there to cut him off.

Stiles stops, steps back on reflex, but then he seems to make up his mind and starts forward again, going for the opening between Derek and the locker.

Derek sticks out his arm and stops him before he can even make it a couple feet, and Stiles must realize that he's not getting out of this, because he lets out this soft, plaintive sort of whine and hopelessly stares at the spot over Derek's shoulder. He looks miserable, sounds that way, too, and Derek almost feels guilty for what he's doing, trapping him like this. Stiles may not be a wolf, but it's still a cruel thing to do.

Cruel, but necessary. He tells himself he'll apologize later.

For now, he uses the arm he's holding out to catch Stiles and pull him in, gently. Stiles resists, dragging his feet the whole way, but Derek still barely has to work to get him pulled against his chest and get his other arm around him. "Hey," he says as Stiles squirms against him. He doesn't tighten his hold, for fear of hurting him, but he doesn't hold firm, cradling Stiles' head against his shoulder. "Stiles, hey, stop."

But Stiles isn't ready to stop yet, isn't ready to calm down. He gets his hands between them, pushing at Derek's chest and trying halfheartedly to push him away.

Derek lets him. Lets him push and squirm, lets him growl and whine and grumble protests. It's better than those fake smiles and jokes. It's honest, even if it is honestly miserable.

"I'm not going to hurt you," he tells him, pressing his nose into Stiles' short hair and trying to focus on the smell of his shampoo over everything else. "You're safe. I'm here, now. You're safe."

It's not that he doesn't think Stiles knows it. He just thinks he needs to hear it.

He's right.

The first sob that breaks from Stiles' throat could just as easily be a laugh, but the ones that follow are clear enough. The mask's down; the act's dropped, and what's left is the strong, but wounded teenage boy that's been tortured, traumatized, and forced to carry the weight of too many people for far too long.

It's Derek's turn to carry it for a while.

At the very least, he thinks, he can carry Stiles for a while. And he knows he's spent too much for time with Stiles – but not really – because his mind goes to one of their movie nights, to that Lord of the Rings movie. One of them; he doesn't know which. He never paid them much attention, really. He was always more focused on other things: holding Stiles, hearing the way his heartbeat and breathing evened out as he finally dozed off, the feeling of peace that filled him when he sat there, his pack scattered in the room around him and his mate asleep in his arms.

He kind of wishes he paid more attention to the movie now, though. Maybe one of those movie puns Stiles is so fond of might be able to at least take the edge off the overwhelming sense of misery that's crashing off Stiles like waves pulled in strong by the moon.

He holds him through it, though, even as Stiles' legs seem to give up and Derek becomes the only thing keeping him up off the floor. He holds him, and he swears to himself and to Stiles that he's going to take every tear out of that son of a bitch Gerard's black blood. He's going to make him pay.

But first things first.

Stiles is starting to settle down. The sobs are getting quieter, and he sniffs against Derek's shirt where he's burrowed under the leather of his jacket. He's still shaking, but Derek can feel the heat of his skin, and he thinks some of the shaking might be from the fever he seems to have.

Definitely more at work here than a bruised cheek and a busted lip.

He doesn't want to – there's a part of Derek that never wants to let Stiles go – but he shifts his hold on Stiles, moving him out enough that he can see his face.

His eyes are still watery; his cheeks flushed a moist, even after he swipes the back of his under armor sleeve across them. That mask is back up, but it's thin and cracked; Derek can see through it, and it wouldn't take much to shatter it again. He doesn't try, though. He'll let Stiles hold onto it, for now.

Instead, he moves a hand back up to Stiles' cheek and brushes his thumb over one of the tracks. Stiles still isn't looking at him, and he's shifting back and forth from foot to foot like he can't actually make himself stay still.

"Stiles, look at me," he says. This whole time, Stiles has been looking anywhere but, and it's bordering on the worrying. Stiles doesn't seem to hear him, except his pulse picks up a little, so Derek takes the initiative to help him along, using the hand on his cheek to tip his head up a little and hold it.

And finally, those brown eyes make it around to Derek. There's an uneasy look in them, a sort of caution that hasn't quite been covered up yet. It's reflected in his body, as Derek slowly reaches down for the hem of his shirt. He's coiled so tight, Derek's waiting for him to snap. He keeps his movements slow because of it. Deliberate, but unthreatening. Stiles has been threatened enough.

Stiles still flinches when his fingers brush his flat belly, and Derek drops the hand on his face down to curl around the back of his neck to keep him still.

"Relax," he tells him.

Stiles chuckles humorlessly. "Easy for you to say," he mumbles, casting his eyes upward.

Derek frowns as he fixes his own eyes on the growing expanse of Stiles' pale skin he's easing the lacrosse jersey up over. "Not as easy as you'd think," he says, more to himself than anything.

In his periphery, he sees Stiles look down at him, a perplexed and surprised and, after a second, maybe just a little bit grateful look on his face. But before Derek can really appreciate the development, his eyes fall on something that makes his stomach clench and his protective instincts scream in outrage.

Stiles is black and blue. And green…and yellow, in some places, and just generally a mess of colors that don't belong on the human body. Especially not on Stiles' body.

In an instant, he's got Stiles backed against the locker, pulling at his pads and shirts in a rush. He needs to see. He needs to see what that Argent _monster_ did to him.

Suddenly, though, there are hands on his wrist, and there's a voice in his ears breaking through the roar of his own blood. "—on the lacrosse gear, Fido. I have to turn that in at the end of the season."

Derek doesn't stop, though; barely even slows down. But he played lacrosse, and years of practice makes him pretty damn adept at getting the gear off in one piece.

"Well, okay then," Stiles says, but he doesn't try to stop him. "You know, I'm all for trying new things, but if this is some sort of exhibitionist thing, you know, with the whole public—"

"Stiles!"

Stiles flinches. An honest, eyes closed, body spasms flinch, and he goes quiet. Derek feels a spike of guilt in his chest, but it's quickly drowned out in the storm of other feelings. Worry, confusion, _fury._

"What the hell were you thinking?" he snaps, because he's got Stiles' shirt off, now, and he can see the full extent of the damage: the mottling of bruises around his left hip and the right side of his ribs, like he was curled up and someone was kicking him; the mess of gauze pads and sloppily-applied band-aids just above the bruise on his hip. The cut they're covering has to be at least three, maybe four inches long, and Derek has no way of telling how deep.

And Stiles didn't tell him.

"Oh, I don't know," Stiles retorts, and for someone that just had a breakdown not five minutes ago, he's awfully cheeky. "I think 'ow' might've crossed my mind a couple times, but it's kind of all a blur."

That's a lie; Derek can hear it in his heartbeat. This close, he can feel it, just as easily as he feels the fever that's flushing his skin. He thinks he knows where it's from, now, too.

The growl slips out on its own, but Derek means damn well to move close, pinning Stiles against the locker and clamping his hand around the back of his neck.

"You should've come to me."

"And told you what?" Stiles shoots back. "'Hey, Derek, I know you're kind of busy with this whole monster trying to kill a whole lot of people, including you and Scott and everyone else I care about in this world, but if you get a second, I've got a couple of booboos that I need you to kiss and not actually make better, but what the hell, it's the thought that counts.' Something like that?"

Derek feels his temper flare. "So you lied to me?"

"I didn't tell you. There's a difference, apparently. Who knew?"

"Stiles, for once in your life, be serious!" Derek roars, and it echoes through the locker room. He's just so _angry_. At _everything_. "Have you seen yourself? Your ribs could be broken. That wound's definitely infected; I can smell it from here, and I know you haven't stitched it." Because tough as Stiles is, that's not something he could do for himself, and judging by that bandage job, he obviously hasn't been to the hospital. "Dammit, Stiles, that bastard could've killed you! You could've died!"

"I know that!" It's the loudest Stiles has yelled, but as soon as he does, he subsides. All the fight seems to leave him, and he drops his gaze to the floor. "God, I know that, Derek." His voice is suddenly hoarse, uneven. "But what was I supposed to do?"

"You should've told me," Derek says, and he sounds, if not calmer, then quieter, too. "I would've taken care of you. I would've—"

"You would've gotten all distracted, maybe gotten yourself killed or the others." Stiles sighs, and it's too tired a sound for someone as young as Stiles to be making. Too world-weary. "And it would've given Gerard something else to flaunt at you. He would've won. If I told you, if I distracted you from what you needed to do, he would've won, and I couldn't—" his voice cracks, and Derek's alarmed to see fresh tears spill out over his fever-flushed cheeks, no matter how violently Stiles tries to stop them.

And suddenly, it hits him. He gets it. He understands. Stiles wasn't hiding his wounds from him; he was hiding them _for_ him. And for himself. Because he couldn't let Gerard win any more than Derek can. He was protecting them, protecting the pack. Protecting Derek.

And now, Derek thinks, even if he won't admit it, he needs someone to return the favor.

Derek's anger doesn't disappear, but it redirects and it fades back for another time. In its place, that protective urge rushes forward, and Derek suddenly needs Stiles in his arms _now_, where he can shield him from everything, keep him safe. Even if Stiles doesn't need it.

So that's what he does. He slips an arm gently, carefully around his bruised waist and back and pulls him close, using the hand on the back of his neck to tip his head up so he can claim his lips.

It's both an apology and a promise. He's sorry for the pain he's caused and the pain he's allowed others to cause, but he swears to keep Stiles safe as he can from now on.

And finally, for the first time that afternoon, Stiles really, truly relaxes into his arms.

"Come on," he says, his voice low after he breaks the kiss. "We need to go." Stiles needs a doctor.

As if reading his mind – although, to Derek's knowledge, that's not among the deceptively brilliant teenager's varied skill sets – Stiles makes a soft noise of protest. "No hospital," he says firmly. "Scott's mom'll call my dad, and it's back enough when I just figuratively give him a heart attack."

Derek understands that. he wants to take Stiles to the hospital anyway, but aside from needing to respect Stiles' wishes – he's earned that by now – it could raise some serious questions that none of them are really ready to answer.

So, instead, he nods. "No hospital," he agrees, stepping back and grabbing Stiles' button-up off his duffel bag. He helps him put it on one arm at a time, and is both amazed that Stiles managed to get all his gear on earlier, and relieved Isaac texted him in time to make all that effort go to waste. And as another shiver wracks Stiles' lithe form, he slides out of his own jacket and pulls that around him, too. Maybe it's cheesy, but Stiles doesn't complain. He seems happy to be warm, and Derek doesn't mind the idea of Stiles smelling like him.

Well, more like him.

"Where to, then, sourwolf?" Stiles asks as Derek gathers up his bags in one arm and curls the other carefully, almost possessively, around his waist.

He tells himself it's because Stiles is still a little unsteady on his feet and not because he's having trouble keeping his instincts on a leash.

"Different kind of doctor."

Stiles must get it, because he laughs as they start down the hall. "Sweet," he says, and even if it's shaky, Derek's relieved to see a little bit of his usual Stiles starting to shine through again. "I'm gonna get patched up by a vet. Scratch that off the bucket list."

Derek rewards the flash of only _mostly _sarcastic positivity with a kiss to his head. "Welcome to the club," he says.

"Do I get a t-shirt? Maybe I'll get one that says 'Team Derek.'"

Derek's so relieved to hear him cracking – bad – jokes again that he can't help smiling. "Maybe I'll get one that says 'Team Stiles.'"

And Stiles turns, then, and looks at him, this big, goofy grin on his face like Derek's just made him the happiest man on earth.

Well, Derek thinks fondly, the second happiest.


End file.
